Funeral costs are expensive and include the cost of preparing the body of the deceased, cost of a casket for presentation and/or burial of the deceased, final disposition costs such as cremation costs or interment costs including vault costs, burial costs, etc. The cost of the casket can vary significantly, depending on the types of materials and finishes used, the type of construction, the level of ornamentation, the interior finishing including panels, draping and lining, etc.
In some circumstances, a rental casket, which may also be referred to as a presentation casket, may be desired for temporary presentation of the deceased during visitation or a memorial service. For example, cremation is increasingly being used as an alternative to interment due to personal preference of the deceased or for budgetary reasons to avoid the costs of purchasing, opening and closing a vault and burial site. In such cases, a rental casket may be used temporarily to present the deceased during visitation or mourning. The deceased may be positioned on a removable tray or in a removable container for placement into the rental casket for presentation. The removable container may be, for example, a paperboard, wooden or other suitably flammable container which burns leaving little or no ash, such that the removable container may also be used as a cremation container. After presentation, the removable container including the deceased is removed from the rental casket for cremation. In another example, a rental casket having expensive finishes and ornamentation may be rented for presentation, and the deceased transferred from the rental casket to a less ornate and less expensive casket for permanent interment.
Wooden caskets having a side wall or floor which is removable to facilitate placement and removal of the removable tray or container in which the deceased is positioned into and from the wooden casket have been used as rental caskets. Metal caskets are generally perceived to be of higher quality in terms of aesthetics, strength, durability, etc., such that a metal casket is preferred or desired by a substantial majority for presentation of the deceased. The casket box of a traditional metal casket is fabricated from stamped metal panels which are welded together such that the floor and walls of the metal casket box have a unitary or continuous structure, and such that the casket box is only accessible through the top of the casket box. As such, insertion and subsequent removal after presentation of a tray or container including a deceased into a unitary metal casket box is cumbersome and presents the risk of dropping or disturbing the positioning of the deceased during movement of the tray or container into and out of the metal casket box, and substantially limits or prevents the use of a metal casket as a rental casket.